Many Companies used Either Vertical integration or Horizontal Integration

Vertical Integration:

the combination in one company of two or more stages of production normally operated by separate companies.

Horizontal Integration:

the acquisition of a business operating at the same level of the value chain in the same industry. 

1712:

-Thomas Newcomen invents the first productive steam engine.

1719:

-John Lombe opens the first silk throwing factory in Great Britain in Derby.

1733:

- James Kay invents a simple weaving machine called the Flying Shuttle.

 Andrew Carnegie: Man of Steel

 -Owned Carnegie Steel Company Made steel using the Bessemer Process Used vertical integration to make his steel empire untouchable 

John D. Rockefeller: Oil Industry

-Owned Standard Oil Company Used horizontal integration to buy out all of his competition 

Cornelius Vanderbilt: Railroad Tycoon

-Created a huge railroad network by merging smaller companies 

JP Morgan Chase: Banking Baron

-Owned JP Morgan Chase Bank

Monopolies: a company that dominates its sector or industry, controlling the majority of the market share of its goods or services, has little to no competitors, and its consumers have no real substitutes for the good or service provided by the business

Trusts: a group of businessmen or traders organized for mutual benefit to produce and distribute specific commodities or services, and managed by a central body of trustees

Laissez- Faire: a doctrine opposing governmental interference in economic affairs beyond the minimum necessary for the maintenance of peace and property rights

“Hands-off” governance, left business alone

Minimal to no laws for businesses and how they should be ran

Social Darwinism: believe in “survival of the fittest”—the idea that certain people become powerful in society because they are innately better

Has been used to justify imperialism, racism, eugenics and social inequality at various times over the past

The other opinion…

Andrew Carnegie believed rich people should give back to society and had a responsibility to put their money to good use. 

Considered to be the Father of Philanthropy. 

Carnegie called this idea The Gospel of Wealth in an article he authored in 1890

Described the responsibility of philanthropy by the new upper class of self-made rich and proposed that the best way of dealing with the new phenomenon of wealth inequality was for the wealthy to redistribute their surplus means in a responsible and thoughtful manner

Distributed more than $350 million of his fortune to fund numerous libraries, churches, museums, colleges, schools, and nonprofits

In 1890, the U.S. Congress passed the Sherman Antitrust Act.

Law passed by Congress to promote competition within the economy by prohibiting companies from colluding or merging to form a monopoly 

Mostly ineffective for more than a decade due to loose wording

Used against labor unions, which were held by courts to be illegal combinations

Not successful until the trust-busting era under President McKinley and President Roosevelt starting in 1898

Another attempt to stop the abuses of big business included the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887.

Law granting Congress the power to regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several States to regulating railroad rates

Met with mass resistance from the railroad companies